We never talk about tight chests

Grief can hold you captive for days and weeks and months, years. 

I feel as though Preeti's passing has now become stuck in my chest. It's always tight. I haven't looked up the phone to check our chats from the past. What is the point in doing that when I know she will no longer be looking? But there's a part of me that seems to think she's still in London. It's also like I'm trying to trick my mind into believing she's not quite gone. Like I had tricked myself into believing she would come back to Kathmandu for good and we would grow old together. But this was not the place she chose for herself.

Home, then, is probably where we're able to spread our wings, even if we don't always fly. Home isn't always where we were born. And so Preeti Didi chose her home-- so far away from us. And every detail about her life, so lost on us. I worry I will never be able to gather all the bits of her to make a full memory. 

Fragments will have to do.

girls standing on the lawn

The spine of the chair shadowing mine, my arms stretched across the desk, my feet dangling before me sometimes, sometimes perched on the floor-- I'm the happiest person when I'm seated at my desk. Nothing else matters while I get to be here.

Until last week, I still had Y's Sanepa desk. And it felt like a special gift. I think I might have walked from room to room admiring Y's apartment and her courage to set up her own place, the entire time I was there. 

I'm yet to find that for myself. But I've taken comfort in knowing it is possible for a Newa girl to step out of her sheltered life and live a life that's her own, even in Kathmandu. 

I read Y's books most nights. She has a really rare collection. None of them are books I've seen before. And most of them are poetry. Y is a poet and you can see it in how she lives. 

One evening, I took a book about girls standing on the lawn and placed it by her bedside because I felt she should wake up to it when she returns home. Then I put it back again where Y had placed it. 

Maybe she wanted the girls on the lawn to be sat on the shelf now.

 

Making our own homes

I've spent ten days at Pilerne village in Goa now and it has been nothing close to my expectations, but better. Rubina was right. She always is. 

The last week of November, as Bhavna and Rubina pulled out of the driveway in the rented car, I felt a tear roll down my right cheek. It felt as though all the good times we had had together in Goa was suddenly over with them leaving. But Rubina had repeatedly said, "It's going to be so good for you, this place". And so it has been!

It has been nothing close to my expectations. I've had some unpleasant incidents with men and one with a pack of dogs ganging up on me. Apart from those, it has been lovely to just focus on myself and learn to cook better, to eat alone with great patience, to do the dishes, clean up. It's taught me that I take Mamu for granted. Doing household work is a lot. Cooking is a lot. She cooks lunch for me everyday and I've rarely shown appreciation for her work. I've been sitting here in Shalini's kitchen, thinking about Mamu so much.

I'm also learning that I'm the kind of person who thrives in distance and loneliness. I've been so at peace with myself here. Apart from a few occasions of intense emotions, I haven't had particular upheavals. If they appear, they're like ripples, they pass gently.

Much of the day is spent cooking, eating, working, watching, reading, then sleeping. It's restful. I've fallen so easily into a routine. Also, the thing about places it, it doesn't take much for us to make it our own. Once you put your mind to it, the place you are at, is your home. And so G2 has been my home for ten days now.

And it has brought me good feelings. I don't feel the emptiness here, I felt in Chiang Mai. I had started to find happiness there in my third month, but the first two, were quite hard. A feeling of having removed myself to a great distance constantly gnawed at me. I haven't felt that way here. And I think it has a lot to do with Rubina. Watching how she's turned India into her home always amazes me and I'm full of admiration for how courageous and smart this girl is. Hanging out with her, Bhavna and Smriti has shown me how strong and wise women are and how they can turn cities they like into their home. Smriti has done the same with Mumbai. As has Bhavna with Kathmandu.

When we were teenagers, Smriti and I used to talk about building pretty homes. Smriti was always about pretty cushions and drapes. We dreamed of pretty things from our middle-class homes, with just a few hundred rupees in out pockets we made from writing newspaper articles. But the dreams were always there. And we've actually been able to live them now in our own ways. In different ways, but we have come to live them. 

That's the bit that makes me happiest about my girlfriends. Each one of us, independent in our own worlds, free to make our decisions. Free to pick our bags and hit the road when we want to and just go walk on the beach for long stretches. It's all the grace I always want for us all.